President to cast his ballot

Obama continued his last-minute, cross-country tour of the nation’s battleground states, blasting Mitt Romney and hoarsely exhorting voters to grant him a second term.

“Don’t boo, vote!” he told supporters at a rally who were expressing their disapproval of the Republican challenger. Obama said he was heading home to Chicago later in the day to cast his ballot and urged those in the crowd to take advantage of Florida’s early voting programme and do the same.

Campaign officials said Obama’s decision to vote early — he will become the first sitting president to do so — is part of the campaign’s all-out effort to get its supporters to the polls.

Meanwhile senior White House adviser David Plouffe, the architect of Obama’s historic election in 2008, spent last Wednesday trying to convince reporters that Romney is claiming false momentum and cannot win an electoral college majority.